5.  The applicant was born in 1974 and lives in Migieşti.
6.  The applicant is a tradesman specialised in installing roof drainage systems. In May – June 2008 he accepted money from four different people in exchange for installing drainage systems in their houses. However, he failed to carry out the required work and declared that he no longer had the money, promising to return it later.
7.  In the early morning of 29 September 2008 he was arrested by the police and brought to Râşcani Police Station in Chişinău, on the grounds of having committed the administrative offence of insulting a police officer. He was allegedly forced to return the money which he had taken from B. I. for installing a roof drainage system on his house. According to the applicant, he had not managed to finish the work on that installation when B. I. asked for the money to be returned and also involved his relatives who worked at Râşcani Police Station in order to intimidate the applicant and obtain full repayment.
8.  On 1 October 2008 B. I. made a complaint to the police, according to which the applicant had defrauded him by accepting money and refusing to return it, while having failed to carry out any work. On 4 October 2008 a criminal investigation against the applicant was initiated.
9.  On an unspecified date one of the applicant’s relatives paid 500 euros (EUR) to B. I., who signed a statement to the effect that he no longer had any claims against the applicant.
10.  On 6 October 2008 the prosecutor asked the Râşcani District Court to order the applicant’s detention for ten days. The applicant was accused of defrauding B. I. by accepting 8,000 Moldovan lei (approximately EUR 560 at the time) in May 2008 as payment for installing a roof drainage system, but failing to carry out any work. He was also accused of two similar offences, but no details other than the case numbers were given. Details were given at subsequent court hearings. A hearing was scheduled for the same day at the Râşcani District Court.
11.  The applicant’s lawyer was not able to read the prosecutor’s request until immediately before the hearing and was not given a copy at that time. He did not see any other documents being submitted to the investigating judge to substantiate the prosecutor’s request and no documents were shown to the defence or discussed by the investigating judge at the hearing.
12.  During the hearing of 6 October 2008 the lawyer informed the court of the payment of EUR 500 to B. I. The prosecutor present at the hearing declared that there was no evidence of any repayment of the monies to B. I. The lawyer then asked that B. I. be heard in order to confirm that payment. The court did not take any formal decision in respect of B. I. and the latter was not heard before the court adopted its decision. During the same hearing, the applicant submitted that he had been arrested on 29 September 2008. The prosecutor confirmed that, stating that the applicant had been arrested on an administrative charge and then arrested again as a suspect in the criminal proceedings. The applicant’s lawyer argued that since his client was suspected of having committed a crime, he should have been arrested in accordance with the criminal procedure. The court did not react in any way to this argument, confining its reasoning to the applicant’s detention after 4 October 2008.
13.  In his decision of 6 October 2008 the investigating judge of the Râşcani District Court granted the prosecutor’s request and ordered the applicant’s detention pending trial for ten days. The reasons given were that:
“the act of which [the applicant] is accused is considered a minor crime, which is a legitimate ground for detention pending trial; the character, degree of harm and circumstances of the crime constitute sufficient grounds for supposing that [the applicant] will interfere with the normal course of the investigation; the materials submitted to the court clearly confirm that there is a reasonable suspicion that [the applicant] committed a minor crime, and there are sufficient grounds to prevent [the applicant] from hindering the establishment of the truth and from absconding from the investigating authority; the materials in the file confirm the reasonable suspicion that [the applicant] might reoffend, as it follows from the information obtained by the investigating authority during the operational phase of the investigation that [the applicant] may have committed other similar offences; ... [the applicant] has no stable income and works periodically, there is no information about his financial status and his state of health is not incompatible with detention; [the applicant] and his lawyer did not submit any evidence in support of their statements; ...”
14.  The applicant’s lawyer appealed, complaining of the applicant’s de facto arrest on 29 September 2008 and his detention thereafter, and of the lack of legal assistance available to the applicant until 6 October 2008. He submitted that the lower court had not dealt with that complaint. He also informed the court of the fact that he had only read the prosecutor’s request at the hearing of 6 October 2008 and had not had time to properly prepare for that hearing. Besides the prosecutor’s request, no other document had been submitted to the court or shown to the defence to substantiate the need for the applicant’s detention. Nor had the prosecutor referred to any additional documents or other evidence during the hearing. The applicant had asked the first-instance court to hear a witness, who could have confirmed that the applicant had had a contract with B. I. and that B. I.’s relatives in the police had threatened the applicant if he refused to return the money for the ongoing work, but the court had refused to hear the witness without giving any reasons. Moreover, the judge had relied on grounds which had not been mentioned by the prosecutor, thus showing bias towards the prosecution. The lawyer relied on Article 5 of the Convention and referred to the absence of any evidence to support the prosecutor’s request for the applicant’s detention pending trial, including the absence of any judgment or other evidence concerning the other similar offences allegedly committed by his client. In the lawyer’s opinion, there had been no reason to believe that the applicant would abscond or interfere with the investigation. Relying on Article 3 of the Convention, the lawyer also complained of the inhuman conditions of his client’s detention.
15.  On 10 October 2008 the Chişinău Court of Appeal rejected the appeal as unfounded, referring to similar grounds as those referred to by the lower court, including that the applicant had allegedly committed other similar offences “as [could] be seen from the criminal file”.
16.  On 13 October 2008 the prosecutor asked for an extension of the applicant’s detention pending trial for thirty days. He referred to three separate occasions on which the applicant had been accused of having accepted money for installing roof drainage systems but had failed to do so, including in respect of B. I.
17.  On the same day the investigating judge of the Râşcani District Court granted the request and ordered the applicant’s detention pending trial for thirty days. The court noted that
“... a serious crime has been committed for which the law provides a penalty of more than two years’ imprisonment; there has been no compensation for the pecuniary damage caused; there are reasons to believe that [the applicant] could abscond or interfere with the normal and objective course of the investigation; the grounds on which the initial detention was ordered remain valid.”
18.  The applicant’s lawyer appealed, relying on the same grounds as in his previous appeal. He added that his client had told the lower court that he owed no debt to B. I., whom he had reimbursed fully. Moreover, the lawyer had read the prosecutor’s request only immediately before the hearing of 13 October 2008. No documents other than the prosecutor’s request had been examined by the court during the hearing or shown to the defence. The lawyer added that the applicant had a stable home life, had two children to support and had not been previously convicted of any offence. He again complained of his client’s inhuman conditions of detention, both at the Râşcani Police Station and at the General Police Department (“the GPD”, see paragraph 22 below), and relied on Article 3 of the Convention in that regard.
19.  On 21 October 2008 the Chişinău Court of Appeal rejected the appeal, relying on the same grounds as those referred to by the lower court.
20.  On 11 November 2008 the Râşcani District Court ordered the applicant’s release. The court found that
“... [the applicant] is accused of having committed a crime for which the law provides punishment [through] alternatives [to imprisonment]; he did not abscond from the investigating authority; he has a permanent residence and two children.”
21.  On 8 May 2009 the Râşcani District Court found the applicant guilty of fraud and sentenced him to three years’ imprisonment, suspended for one year. In his submissions to the court the applicant acknowledged having taken money from B. I. in May 2008. After a while, he had manufactured the relevant items but had not been able to install them because of personal family circumstances obliging him to remain home with his children. The court found that he had taken money from three other people in May – July 2008 and had also failed to carry out the work which he had undertaken to do for them.
22.  According to the Government, the applicant had been detained for one night at the Râşcani Police Station on 29 September 2008 and had then been transferred to the General Police Department (Comisariatul General de Poliţie or “the GPD”), where he had been detained until 11 November 2008.
23.  The applicant described his conditions of detention at the Râşcani Police Station as follows: he had been held in a cell without a bed or any other furniture; there had been no ventilation, toilet or running water in the cell; he had not been given any food and had had to beg for it from other detainees; the cell had been overcrowded and many detainees had smoked, exposing the applicant to passive smoking; and the cell had been damp.
24.  According to the applicant, at the GPD he had been placed together with seven other people in a cell measuring 12 square metres. The cell had been dirty and infested with parasitic insects and rats. There had been no furniture in the cell, and the detainees had slept directly on the floor, in their own clothes. The cell had been damp and very cold. A low-intensity lamp, covered by a metal sheet, had been switched on twenty-four hours a day and there had not been a window in the cell. The toilet had not been separated from the rest of the cell, offering no privacy. Due to the large number of people using it, the toilet had been occupied most of the time and had smelt bad. The applicant had not been given any personal hygiene items, clean clothes or bed linen. He had had to continually wear the clothes in which he had been arrested. The applicant had received little food, which had been of a very bad quality (a cup of warm water in the morning and evening and boiled vegetables with warm water for lunch). Even though he had had a stomach ulcer and high intracranial blood pressure, he had not received any medical assistance. He had been detained in such conditions for twenty-four hours a day, without any right to take exercise or to take part in recreational activities.